USA > Virginia > Albemarle County > Albemarle County > Albemarle County in Virginia; giving some account of what it was by nature, of what it was made by man, and of some of the men who made it > Part 12
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About the time of Mr. Black's settlement in Albemarle, Rev. Samuel Davies commenced his work in Hanover County. He had at first no little trouble with the State authorities, whose intervention was invoked by some bigoted ministers of the establishment under the old repressive laws against non-conformity. He however boldly and skilfully appealed to the provisions of the English Act of Toleration, which he claimed applied to the colonies no less than to the mother country, and was soon able to pursue his labors without molestation. He gathered several congregations, reaching from Hanover through Louisa and Goochland to Charlotte County. In 1755 the Presbytery of Hanover was formed. At their first meeting, they received a petition from the peo - ple of Albemarle near Woods's Gap, asking for preaching, and Mr. Davies himself being appointed spent with them the second Sunday of March 1756. From that time through a
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number of years, they had, besides the services of Mr. Black, those of Mr. Davies, John Todd, John Brown, John Martin, Henry Patillo and others. These ministers occasionally preached to the people on Buck Island at Mr. Lewis's-un - questionably at Monteagle-to those living between the Secretary's Ford and the mountains-no doubt in the Char- lottesville courthouse, and at D. S. Church-to those at North Garden at Mr. Garland's, and to those at the Cove at George Douglas's.
As years passed on, ministers born and educated in Vir - ginia were settled in the county. In 1769 Rev. William Irvin, who had been a pupil at Mr. Todd's school in Louisa, became pastor of the Cove Church. In 1770 Rev. Samuel Leake accepted a call to the D. S. Church. The next year Mr. Irvin extended his labors to Rockfish and Mountain Plains.
The Presbytery of Hanover convened with considerable frequency in the churches of the county. It met at Rockfish in 1772, 1773 and 1775, at the Cove in 1793, 1794, 1799, 1800, and 1803, and at the D. S. in 1771, 1772, 1775 and 1792. The last time it met at D. S. was in October 1809, holding night sessions at the house of John R. Kerr. At that meet- ing Rev. Thomas Lumpkin, a young minister, who had taught school for a short time in the neighborhood, was to have been ordained, and installed as pastor, but unhappily he had died the preceding month. The membership of this church was so much reduced by deaths and removals, that two years later its organization was dissolved. The ground on which it stood, aud which had been conveyed to the congregation in 1773 by Joel Terrell, passed into the hands of Jesse Lewis, who within the memory of some now living re- moved the old building. Two meetings of the Presbytery were held in Walker's Church. The first occurred in 1814, when they convened at night at the house of Captain Meri - wether. At that time it received under its care John Robert- son, the father of Judge W. J. Robertson, as a candidate for the ministry. The second meeting took place in 1819, and night sessions were held at the house of John Rogers. It
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met at Mountain Plains in 1778, and for the last time in October 1828, when they held night sessions at the house of the elder William Woods, of Beaver Creek.
South Plains Church was established in 1820, as the result of the labors of Rev. William Armstrong, and Rev. James C. Wilson. John Kelly, of Charlottesville, was one of its first elders. A branch of the same church worshipped on the west side of the South West Mountain at Bethel. It was not until 1870, that Bethel was set apart as a separate organ- ization. Rev. Francis Bowman began preaching at South Plains iu 1822, preaching occasionally also at the court- house. Under his ministry the first Presbyterian house of worship in Charlottesville was built in 1827. In that year the lot on which it stood, on the southeast corner of Market and Second Streets, was conveyed by James Dinsmore to John Kelly, James O. Carr, Francis Bowman, Thornton Rogers, William Woods, Surveyor, Thomas Meriwether and Dr. John Holt Rice, as trustees of the new congregation. It was not constituted a distinct organization until 1839, when it was under the ministry of Dr. William S. White.
The Presbyterian Church of Scottsville was founded in 1827, chiefly through the agency of Rev. Peyton Harrison. He had settled there as a young lawyer in 1825. Having been converted by the preaching of Rev. Asahel Nettleton, he became actively interested in religious work, and rested not till a church was formed. Shortly after he relinquished the law, and studied for the ministry. When he became a preacher, he returned to Scottsville, and was settled as pastor over the church for a brief period. Dr. William S. White succeeded him, and continued his labors there until he re- moved to Charlottesville.
BAPTIST.
The first Baptist Church in the county was organized in January 1773. This event took place in Lewis's Meeting House, which stood on old David Lewis's place, on the ele - vated ground south of the Staunton Road, about where the house of Mrs. Humbert now stands. The church commenced
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with a membership of forty-eight persons. George Twy - man, who lived just south of Earlysville, was one of its origi- nal members, and at a meeting held two months later presided as Moderator. The influence of the Presbyterian polity, under which doubtless many of the members had grown up, was apparent in their earliest proceedings. The original organization was effected by two ministers and an elder, and at a subequent meeting it was determined that "the feeling of the church concerning elders and deacons should be made known." It was several years without a pastor, but was occasionally supplied by such ministers as John Waller, and Elijah and Lewis Craig. This church was variously called by the names of Albemarle, Buck Mountain and Ches- nut Grove. In 1801 they took possession of the old Buck Mountain Church of the Establishment, which had been disused by the Episicopalians. When that place of worship was claimed by its former owners, they removed to the union church in Earlysville in 1833, and in 1879 erected their pres - ent building about a mile west of that place.
Andrew Tribble was chosen their pastor in 1777, and was ordained by Lewis Craig and others. How long Mr. Tribble continued in that relation is not known. He purchased a farm of one hundred and seventy-five acres a short distance below the D. S. Tavern, which he sold in 1785, and it is likely he performed his pastoral duties until that time. Wil- liam Woods, distinguished as Baptist Billy, was ordained at Lewis's Meeting House by Messrs. Tribble and Benjamin Burgher in 1780, and became the pastor when the work of Mr. Tribble ceased. In 1798 Mr. Woods became a candidate for the Legislature; and as the law of Virginia at that time prohibited a minister from holding a civil office, he relin- quished his ministerial calling at Garrison's Meeting House in November of that year.
When the church was first formed, it was in the bounds of Dover Association, which then embraced the whole State. In 1791 the Albemarle Association was constituted, including the territory south of the Rapidan, and west of a line run- ning from Barnett's Ford on the Rappahannock to the mouth
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of Byrd Creek on the James. Up to this time eight other churches had been founded, four of which lay within the present limits of the county, Totier in 1775, Ballenger's Creek probably about the same time, Priddy's Creek in 1784, and Whitesides, now Mount Ed, in 1788. Martin Dawson became a minister soon after 1774, and preached for many years at Totier, which was situated near Porter's Precinct, and was then commonly known as Dawson's Meeting House. His labors however extended largely over the whole county. Benjamin Burgher, who lived on the headwaters of Mechum's River, was for a long period the pastor of Mount Ed. In 1822 he, Benjamin Ficklin and John Goss had advertised to begin a protracted meeting on a certain day at Mountain Plains, but on the very day of the appointment Mr. Burgher rested from his earthly labors. John Goss came to the county from Madison in 1802.
In 1820 Daniel Davis, Jr., a Baptist minister, preached occasionally in Charlottesville, sometimes in the courthouse, and sometimes in a large room of John Burrus. An organi- zation seems to have existed in town at that date, as Mr. Davis advertised that he would baptize those who had made a declaration of their faith to the church. Yet it appears that the formal establishment of the Charlottesville Church did not take place till August 1831. On that occasion four ministers were present, John Goss, Valentine Mason, Reuben L. Coleman and Charles Wingfield. Dr. Hardin Massie was appointed its Clerk. In October 1835, Dr. Massie conveyed to Nimrod Bramham, William Dunkum, Isaac White and Lewis Teel as trustees, a part of Lot No. Five, on which, it was stated in the deed, the Baptist Church "stands." In 1853 the Circuit Court granted permission to sell the old church property, and appointed as trustees for the new church, William P. Farish, Lewis Sowell, James Lobban, John T. Randolph, John Simpson, James Alexander and B. C. Flan - nagan.
METHODIST.
The first mention of a Methodist Church in the county occurred in 1788 in a deed from James Harris to Thomas
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Jarman, whereby seventy-five acres on the north side of Moorman's River were conveyed, surrounding two acres before given, on which "the Methodist Episcopal Church stands." This was beyond question the predecessor of Mount Moriah at Whitehall. The lot on which the latter was built, three and three-fourths acres, was conveyed in 1834 by Daniel and Hannah Maupin to Jesse P. Key, Wil - liam Rodes, Thompson and Horace Brown and David Wiant. Many years anterior to the date just mentioned this church was commonly known as Maupin's Meeting House, and was a favorite place for holding camp meetings. Henry Fry, a former deputy Clerk of the county, speaks in his autobiog- raphy of Bishop Asbury preaching at an early day at Tandy Key's, who lived north of the Cove, at the junction of the Austin Gap and Lynchburg Roads; and in that vicinity, probably on Key's land, was located a building, which went by the name of Key's Meeting House, but of which no trace now remains. In 1795 Henry Austin conveyed a parcel of land to Thomas Stribling, Samuel Wills, Joseph Hardesty, Bernis Brown, Daniel Maupin, John Gibson, George Bing- ham, William Oliver and Basil Guess, of Orange, for a church, which was then called Austin's Meeting House, and is no doubt the same as that now known as Bingham's Church. In 1808 Bland Ballard donated one-fourth of an acre for a Methodist Church, which was the old Ivy Creek Church on the Barracks Road.
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The first Methodist preacher on record was Athanasius Thomas, who was licensed to celebrate the rites of matrimony in 1793. This gentleman was the purchaser of several small tracts of land in the vicinity of Mountain Plains Church, where in all probability he made his home. In 1811 he dis - posed of this property, and presumably removed to another part of the country. Following him were Bernis Brown in 1794, John Gibson in 1797, John Goodman in 1802, and Jacob Watts in 1806. About the beginning of the century, there came to the county from Maryland two men, who although laymen filled the place of local preachers, John B. Magruder and George Jones. For many years they did a
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good work, and exercised a strong influence in behalf of their own church, and of true religion. In November 1823 a Dis - trict Conference met in Charlottesville, of which James Boyd was President, and Walker Timberlake, Secretary.
The Charlottesville Church was established in 1834. In June of that year William Hammett purchased from Mary Wales, and other representatives of Thomas Bell, Lot No. Fifty-Five, and in the ensuing October conveyed it to Gess - ner Harrison, Nathan C. Goodman, Stapleton Sneed, Mat - thew and Thomas F. Wingfield, Ebenezer Watts and Thomas Pace as trustees, for a Methodist Church.
During the twelve years from 1825 to 1837 there was a great accession of church buildings in the county. In the first of these years were built the Charlottesville Episcopal Church, and a Methodist Church near Hammock's Gap; in 1827, the Charlottesville Presbyterian Church ; in 1828, Mount Zion Methodist Church, and Mount Pleasant Methodist, near Hillsboro; in 1830, the Scottsville Presbyterian Church; in 1831, the Buck Island Methodist Church ; in 1832, the Scotts- ville and Shiloh Methodist Churches ; in 1833, Wesley Chapel, Earlysville Free Church, and the Charlottesville and Milton Baptist Churches; in 1834, Bethel Presbyterian, Charlottes - ville and Mount Moriah Methodist, and Hardware Baptist Churches; in 1835, Cross Roads Episcopal Church ; in 1836, Charlottesville Disciples Church ; and in 1837, Free Union Free, and Piney Grove Baptist Churches.
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CHAPTER VII. ACCOUNT OF FAMILIES.
ABELL.
The first Abell in the county was Caleb, who came from Orange near the end of the last century. In 1798 he pur- chased what is still known as the old Abell place on Moore's Creek. It originally consisted of six hundred and ninety- four acres, comprising three different grants, but all bought from the executors of Henry Mullins, of Goochland. Caleb conveyed it to his son, John S. Abell, in 1808. John S. en- tered the Baptist ministry about 1830, and died in 1859. In 1816 he married Lydia Ralls, and his children were Alexan- der P., who was a magistrate under the old regime, was first a merchant in Charlottesville, then Teller in the Monticello and Charlottesville National Banks, married Ann, daughter of William McLeod, and about 1876 removed to Greenville, S. C .; George W., who was one of the early ministers of the Disciples Church; and J. Ralls, whose wife was Susan, daughter of William Dunkum.
Besides John S., there were Joshua Abell, who married Caroline, and Richard, who married Emily, daughters of Benjamin Martin, of North Garden; Caleb, who married Jane, daughter of William Black; and Benjamin F., whose wife was Elizabeth, daughter of Joseph Grayson.
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ALPHIN.
John Alphin began to purchase land in the county in 1778, when he became the owner of two hundred and fifty acres on Meadow Creek between the Staunton and White- hall Roads. He continued his purchases till he acquired more than a thousand acres in one body. He con- ducted a noted hostelry, situated nearly opposite the resi- dence of Jesse Lewis, and for many years a favorite resort for men of the turf. He furnished excellent accommodations,
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a prime cuisine, large stables, and a track for training horses. His house was a place of wide notoriety at the beginning of the century.
He married Martha, daughter of Christopher Shepherd, and his children were Julius, Sarah, the wife of William Chapman, Jane, the wife of David Owen, Nancy, the wife of William Fagg, Mary, the wife of Blake Harris, and Elizabeth. He sold to the county in 1806 the land on which the old Poor House was built. He died in 1818. Most of his family dis- posed of their interests in his estate, and removed to the West, some of them to Blount County, Tennessee.
ANDERSON.
David Anderson and his wife Elizabeth, came from Han- over County, and lived on a plantation in Albemarle, not far from Scottsville. David died in 1791, and his wife in 1804. They had eight sons, William, Nathaniel, Thomas, Richard, David, Matthew, Edmund and Samuel, and three daugh- ters. Of the daughters, Ann was married to Dabney Minor, of Hanover, Sarah, to Chrisopher Hudson, and the third to a Barrett, whose son Anderson Barrett lived in Richmond, and was an executor of both his grand - parents. One of the sons, Nathaniel, had his residence on the old glebe of St. Anne's on Totier, which he bought from John Breckinridge in 1796. He married Sarah, daughter of John Carr, of Bear Castle, and sister of Dabney, Mr. Jefferson's brother-in-law. He died in 1812, and left four children, William, Nathaniel, Mary, the wife of a Mosby, and Elizabeth, the wife of a Lawrence. Nathaniel married Sarah Elizabeth , and liis children were Mar- tha, the wife of Stephen Woodson, Mary, Dabney Minor and Overton. Edmund, son of David, is thought to be the same person who married Jane, daughter of William Lewis, and sister of the celebrated explorer, Meriwether Lewis. He died in 1809, leaving two sons and four daughters, William, Dr. Meriwether, who married Lucy Harper, Aun, the wife of Thomas Fielding Lewis, Jane, the wife of Benjamin Wood, Lucy, the wife of - , Buckner, and Sarah, the wife of Gabriel Harper.
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Richard Anderson, son of David, married Ann Meriwether, sister of Lucy, the wife of William Lewis. He at one time owned an interest in the land on Ivy Creek on which the Prison Barracks were built, and which he sold to John Har- vie about a year before their building took place. His son David was living at Milton at the beginning of the century, and represented Brown, Rives & Co., one of the firms doing business in that town. In 1801 David was appointed a magistrate of the county, but resigned the next year. Some time after he removed to Richmond. He married Susan, daughter of Reuben Moore, of Culpeper, and his children were Meriwether L., Richard, Catharine, the wife of Jefferson Trice, of Richmond, and Helen, the wife of a Porter. In 1829 he returned to Albemarle, and married again Mary, daughter of Thomas W. Lewis, and widow of James Leitch, and two years later his son Meriwether married Eliza Leitch, daughter of his step-mother. Their home was at Pantops. David Anderson died in 1841, and Meriwether in 1872.
It is believed Richard Anderson had two other sons, Edmund and Jasper. Edmund married first Frances Moore, sister of his brother David's first wife. Some years later he married Ann, daughter of William Cole, of North Garden, and not long after Jasper married her sister, Susan Cole. In 1813 Edmund purchased from Clifton Rodes, executor of John Jouett, sixty acres of land lying east and north of Charlottes . ville, and extending from the present Ninth Street east to the hill overlooking Schenk's Branch, and laid it out in town lots . This tract was known as Anderson's Addition. He sold a number of lots, chiefly on East Jefferson and Park Streets, during the decade of 1820, and in 1831 conveyed to John J. Winn and Alexander Garret Lot Thirty-Four, the present Maplewood Cemetery. In the meantime he removed to Rich - mond, and entered into business under the firms of Anderson & Woodson, and of Anderson, Woodson & Biggers; but the business failing, he transferred all his property in Albe- marle to John R. Jones as trustee, who in 1829 sold it for the payment of his debts. A son, Charles Anderson, was a Druggist in Richmond, and a few years ago removed to Roanoke, where he died.
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BALLARD.
Ballard was one of the first names of the county in the order of time. As early as 1738, Thomas Ballard obtained a patent for three hundred and twenty acres near the foot of Piney Mountain. His descendants became numerous, all having large families, and occupying farms in the stretch of country between Piney Mountain and Brown's Cove. Thomas died in 1781, leaving six sons and three daughters, Thomas, William, John, David, Bland, Samuel, Ann, the wife of Gabriel Maupin, Frances, and Susan, the wife of William Pettit. The second Thomas died in 1804. His children were John, James, Ann, the wife of a Bruce, Mary, the wife of a Davis, Lucy, the wife of Joseph Harvey, Eliza - beth, the wife of Frost Snow, and Martha, the wife of Thomas Pettit. John married, it is believed, Elizabeth, daughter of Roger Thompson, and died in 1829, leaving seven sons and one daughter, Edward, James, David, John, Nicholas, Wil - liam, Wilson, and Elizabeth, the wife of Pleasant Jarman. James, brother of John, married Ann, daughter of David Rodes, and died in 1853. His children were Garland, Thomas, David, Susan, the wife of Thomas L. Shelton, Selina, the wife of Thomas Bohannon, Judith, the wife of Nimrod Day, Frances, the wife of Porter Cleveland, Sophia, the wife of Hudson Oaks, and Mary, the wife of William Thompson. William, son of the first Thomas, married a daughter of William Jarman, and lived below Mechum's Depot; and his son John P., after occupying a position with Valentine, Fry & Co. in Charlottesville, removed to Rich- mond, where he founded the Ballard House, formerly one of the most popular hotels of that city. Bland married Frances, daughter of John Shiflett, and died in 1809. His family consisted of five sons and ten daughters. He donated the ground on which the old Ivy Creek Methodist Church was built.
BARCLAY.
Robert Barclay and his wife Sarah lived, in the early part of the century, on the south side of the road leading from the Cross Roads to Israel's Gap, at the place where James B.
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Sutherland now resides. There Barclay died in 1818, and his widow was afterwards married to John Harris, of Viewmont. He left two sons and two daughters, Mary E., who became the wife of John D. Moon Sr. , Thomas J., James T., and Ann Maria, the wife of Edward H. Moon. Thomas died unmarried in 1828. About the same time James came to Charlottesville, and opened a drug store. He lived in the brick house on the northeast corner of Market and Seventh Streets, which he bought in 1830 from Rev. F. W. Hatch. This place and some other property he sold to T. J. Randolph, and the same year purchased from him Monticello, containing five hundred and fifty-two acies, then valued at seven thousand dollars, the transaction being in all probability an exchange. He resided there till 1836, when he sold it with two hundred and eighteen acres to Commodore Uriah P. Levy. He then be - came a Disciples minister, and sailed as a missionary to Jerusalem, where he remained for many years. As the re- sult of his researches there, he published a large work de- scriptive of the place, entitled The City of the Great King. He and his wife Julia had several children, among them a son, who was appointed by Mr. Cleveland in his first term Consul to Algiers, where a kinsman of the same name had discharged the same functions a hundred years before. The latter part of Mr. Barclay's life was spent in this country with a son in Alabama, where he died a few years ago.
BARKSDALE.
William Barksdale is noticed in the records in 1765. He was for a number of years a buyer of land, chiefly on the south fork of the Rivanna north of Hydraulic Mills, and on the upper part of Mechum's River. He and his wife Ann were the parents of eleven children, Nathan, Goodman, Samuel, Jonathan, John H., Nelson, -, the wife of John Douglass, Ann, the wife of Alexander Fretwell, Sarah, the wife of Wil- liam Warwick, of Amherst, Lucy, the wife of Richard Burch, and Elizabeth. William Barksdale died in 1796, and some years later his widow was married to Philip Day.
Nathan seems to have died young, leaving two sons,
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Achilles and Douglass, to whom their grandfather gave a tract of land on Mechum's River above the Depot of that name. Goodman and Jonathan were settled in the same neighborhood. Goodman died in 1832. Jonathan married Lucy, daughter of Giles Rogers, and died in 1831. His children were Nancy, the wife of George W. Kinsolving, Lucy, the wife of Richard Rothwell, Ralph, Nathan, who married his cousin Elizabeth, daughter of Parmenas Rogers, and whose children were Ralph, Lucy, Mary and George, and William G., who married Elmira, daughter of John Wood. Jonathan formerly owned the land on which the village of Hillsboro stands.
Samuel Barksdale lived between the old Lynchburg Road and Dudley's Mountain. He was twice married, first to Mary, daughter of Jeremiah Hamner, and secondly to Jemima, daughter of Charles Wingfield Sr. His children by the first marriage were Elizabeth, the wife of William Wat - son, long the keeper of the county jail, and Mary, the wife of William Douglass. Those by the second were Rice G., whose wife was Elizabeth White, whose children were John H. Jr., and James S., and who died in 1879, John, who was a Presbyterian minister, one of the first set of students at Union Theological Seminary, but who died in Charlottesville in 1829, just after entering upon his work, Jane, the wife of Willis Day, and Sarah, the wife of Richard Fretwell.
John H. Barksdale resided north of Hydraulic Mills. His children were Hudson, Elizabeth, the wife of Charles Over - street, and Orlando, who some years ago lost his life on the Railroad near the Burnt Mills, in the act of saving Edward Gilbert from being crushed by a passing train. Nelson was the most active and thrifty of the family. His home was also north of Hydraulic Mills. For many years he farmed the Sheriffalty of the county, and was Proctor of the Uni - versity while it was yet in its humbler guise as Central Col - lege. He died in 1861. He married Jane, daughter of Jesse Lewis, and his children were Mary Jane, the wife of J. Frank Fry, Sarah, the wife of John J. Bowcock, Sophia, the wife of James Fray, John T., Eliza, the wife of Albert Terrell,
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